Who's watching what you do on the Internet?

Protecting your online privacy

Here are some tips:

•First, you have rights. California's privacy law says any private information can only be shared if both parties agree. Privacy advocates point to this law as one reason they consider new online monitoring techniques illegal.

•The only way not to have your information tracked is to tell your service provider not to. Most providers who track this information have a way for you to opt out online by clicking on a few buttons. If not, you'll have to call your provider directly.

•Sign up with a provider that does not partner with an advertising monitor. Cox Communications, a leading provider in Orange County, does not participate with companies that target online advertising.

• For information on how to get snoop proof e-mail, password security and how to surf the Web anonymously check out the Electronic Privacy information Center's online guide to practical privacy tools. You can find it at epic.org/privacy/tools.html. EPIC is a public interest research center in Washington, D.C.

•Google has a privacy channel on YouTube that teaches users how to make their online activity private. It can be found at www.youtube.com/googleprivacy.

WASHINGTON - Google and Microsoft officials told lawmakers Wednesday that the personal information you pump onto the Internet isn’t so private and is being turned into advertising dollars.

This Internet executives were called to testify before the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, which is probing online advertising’s effect on user privacy. The hearing was spurred by a new type of tracking that privacy advocates say is comparable to wiretapping people’s phones.

This new strategy is called “deep packet inspection, which can monitor every Web page visited, every e-mail sent and every search entered. This is all divided into packets, like digital folders, that can be opened and analyzed for content. Some Internet service providers have started sharing that content with advertising networks, which use the information to match advertisers with likely customers.

Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., who chaired the hearing, said he was concerned about the security of private information being collected and a user’s lack of control over it.

“If my service provider asked me ‘Is it OK if we give everything you do to another company?’ I’d say of course it’s not OK. The answer is no. N-O.”

Advertising networks say the new system is a win-win, since the ads are targeted to what users want to see. But critics of this type of monitoring likened it to wiretapping at the hearing.

“This new ISP model may provide access to everything we do onlineâ¦and users don’t have information that their Web traffic is intercepted by their ISP and shared,” said Leslie Harris, president of the Center for Democracy and Technology, a privacy advocacy group. “In our view, the (federal wiretapping) law doesn’t permit it.”

Lydia Parnes, director of consumer protection at the Federal trade Commission, said without safeguards, private information may fall into the wrong hands or be used for unanticipated purposes.

Internet companies have been using tracking systems called cookies to match advertisements to user’s online activity, known as behavioral advertising, for years. So if you visit a travel Web site, the next advertisement sent to your screen could be for discount airfare. But this new behavioral advertising may put user’s privacy at greater risk, lawmakers said.

On top of that, many consumers are unaware they’re information is being collected and many who are aware are uncomfortable with being tracked. Parnes said about 60 percent of respondents to two recent surveys said they are uncomfortable with behavioral advertising.

NebuAd—one of the first companies who designed the new monitoring system—has come under fire by privacy advocates who liken their monitoring to illegal wiretapping.

NebuAd Chairman Robert Dykes told lawmakers everything they collect is anonymous. He also said sensitive information such as medical and financial information is not shared with advertisers.

But privacy advocates don’t care if it’s shared or not. They say the problem is it’s being tracked and stored. Harris said it’s impossible that NebuAd can keep the private information they collect anonymous.

“There must be some identifier, otherwise there’s no way they can target ads to you,” she said after the hearing. “They’re not just taking a one time snapshot; they’re updating each profile over time.”

Also, she said the “fact that they have any information that’s anonymous or unidentifiable doesn’t matter.” Getting service providers to give out user’s private information is like telephone companies listening in on conversations and is unlawful, she said.

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